Book Review

Living to Tell the Tale by Gabriel García Márquez

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


"...novels do not begin the way you want them to, but the way they want to."

I was prompted to read Gabriel Garcia Marquez's autobiography by his formative reading list put together by Maria Popova and her assertion that: "Living to Tell the Tale is a glorious read in its entirety — the humbling and infinitely heartening life-story of one of the greatest writers humanity ever produced." https://www.brainpickings.org/2015/04...

It is indeed a glorious read in its entirety. A master at the end of his life writing about the things he most loved and lived is kind of magical. This book is like a portal into another time and place and culture, a different way of being in world. In recounting the stories of his life and family he reveals the incidents and people that inspired events in his novels. My favorite: the Colonel who finds a different woman in his bed each night of the war resulting in the 17 Aurelianos in "One Hundred Years of Solitude" is based on his own Grandfather and all these Uncles he didn't know about showing up at their house with crosses on their foreheads one year on Ash Wednesday.

There are a lot of names in the book, but instead of being confusing they impart meaning and importance to each individual. This book is only the first half of his life. I'm very much hoping he wrote a 2nd part before he died in 2014. I was hoping it would give me an idea of which book of his to read next; I've only read the one, but most of his books were written later. Anyone have a recommendation?



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Death is Nothing at All

By Henry Scott-Holland

Death is nothing at all. 
It does not count.
I have only slipped away into the next room.
Nothing has happened.

Everything remains exactly as it was.
I am I, and you are you,
and the old life that we lived so fondly together is untouched, unchanged.
Whatever we were to each other, that we are still.

Call me by the old familiar name.
Speak of me in the easy way which you always used.
Put no difference into your tone.
Wear no forced air of solemnity of sorrow.

Laugh as we always laughed at the little jokes that we enjoyed together.
Play, smile, think of me, pray for me.
Let my name be ever the household word that it always was.
Let it be spoken without an effort, without the ghost of a shadow upon it.

Life means all that it ever meant.
It is the same as it ever was.
There is absolute and unbroken continuity.
What is this death but a negligible accident?

Why should I be out of mind because I am out of sight?
I am but waiting for you, for an interval, 
somewhere very near,
just around the corner.

All is well.
Nothing is hurt; nothing is lost.
One brief moment and all will be as it was before.
How we shall laugh at the trouble of parting when we meet again!

Book Review

Murder on the Orient Express by Agatha Christie

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


"I have been very fortunate in my profession. I have made enough money to satisfy both my needs and my caprices." Hercule Poirot

First I came across Steve Hayes' fun review of the 1974 movie 'Murder on the Orient Express'(https://youtu.be/segmFF7WQrc). The film is every bit as fun as his review; all 1940s glamour and fluff. Still glowing from the movie I started reading Agatha Christie's book.

The book is very good, of course, but not quite as much fun as the 1974 film(I haven't seen the 2017 film version yet). However, I've learned I'm no great fan of mystery novels. I enjoy the movies and TV shows made from them but the reading not as much. I did read 'And Then There Were None' and liked it a little bit better.

But Agatha Christie fans will love this. It's Hercule Poirot in all of his fastidious glory.



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Book Review

Sing, Unburied, Sing by Jesmyn Ward

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


"Before she was more gone than here. Before she started snorting crushed pills. Before all the little mean things she told me gathered and gathered and lodged like grit in a skinned knee."

I heard about this book when my friend Sheryl shared an article on Facebook about NPR's new book club Now Read This and this book by Jesmyn Ward as their first selection. I've never jumped on a book club bandwagon before, but this one resonated and, having just finished a book, I downloaded it and started reading. I'm very glad I did.

Sing, Unburied, Sing centers around a biracial(I kind of hate that word; we're all one race, but people with a black parent and a white parent do have a very different experience than the rest of us) boy growing up in the rural American South. His life is kind of brutal but he's got the strength for it.

While the book centers around Jojo, it's written in first person and each character tells their own story giving the reader insight into all of their strengths and blemishes. The sultry, humid Southern countryside is its own character woven throughout the story so that the people seem to grow out from the land and the land gets its character from the people.
"The music, all violins and cellos, swells in the room, then recedes, like the water out in the Gulf before a big storm."
I loved this book. I think you will, too.



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